Paul Papadimitriou

Look at your Twitter feed. Retweet is the new Twitter trend, but there’s no cohesion on how it’s done.

Until Twitter decides to implement the feature directly, the developers are having a innovation field day on how to do it:

Retweet @, RT @, via @, etc.

Since we get only 140 characters to get a message through and because the acknowledgement is both necessary and polite, many tend to think there should be no question about it:  go the TweetDeck way, use RT @.

It’s short, effective and to the point. Is it really?

Have your say and comment!

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I was reading this Slate article today, and it struck me once more: people love Facebook, yet they tend to find the service “creepy”. Pardon me, but it’s just naive.

150 millions users, apparently logging in at least once a day. Yes, Facebook is a runaway success. It has made a long way since it’s college-alumni model to a friends-everywhere network.

While some would say that its catch is the mix of voyeurism and exhibitionism, I beg to differ.

Why people join Facebook?

You know what’s the first reason people use Facebook? To reconnect with old friends. And that’s why they keep coming back.

That’s also why I signed in in the first place and certainly why you did too.

I was curious to see how people did interact and who I could find. Well, past colleagues, alumni, long-lost friends, I could find them all and it’s been a rewarding experience to reconnect.

Voyeurism?

Does that make you, me and the 150m others a community of voyeurs?

Well, of course, you could spend hours watching people putting their family pictures, but do you really care? Do you really have the time to do that? And, more to the point, is it Facebook’s fault?

Let me remind those who enjoy criticizing that Facebook is only a platform. No one is forcing you to join and no one is certainly forcing you to put your life online!

And even if we can all admit that procrastinating by staying far too long on the platform happens to the best of us, it’s, again, not Facebook’s fault.

Just stick with one motto, discipline, and you’ll be fine.

Privacy is a choice

Now, if people finding Facebook “creepy” are not actually spending their time watching others’ online lives, their claims must be based on a feeling of others’ prying on their online activity.

Another reminder: it’s all about what you put online. Don’t start adding drunken-parties pictures and then lament that a employer was able to catch them. Don’t engage in touchy subjects like politics and religion if you don’t want others to find out.

Don’t be naive, everything you put online will be found in a way or another. Be smart about it.

Then, come on, Facebook has maybe the best privacy settings management there is, as far as social networks go! You can decide, on an individual level, who is going to have access to your pictures (or set of pictures), the events you’re creating, the notes your writing, to the links you’re sharing.

People that don’t try these and then complaint are just lazy. Full point.

Friends v. Friendship

Another often-heard critic is about the “Friend” term. Are all the people connected with you really “friends”?

It’s just semantics, not a real debate. Friends, in the social networking space, means network. And it’s up to you to decide how you consider the term. If you want to connect with only the people you know, just don’t accept random friend invites. Be coherent.

In my Facebook network, some “Friends” are people I’ve met, some are business partners, some are people I share an interest with and some, the minority -real lasting friendships are scarce- are my real friends.

And like in life, I don’t share the same debates and interests with all of them. On Facebook, I simply use the friends’ list option and privacy settings to fine-tune the activities I display to those different breed of friends.

When not a single business-related “friend” ever gets access to my private pictures, the service does not “creepy”. That’s as simple as that.

Ok, I’ll admit it, there’s one fault-line in my argument: people putting pictures of me without my consent.  That’s where you should be attentive. Being on Facebook gets you more public. Having worked in a highly public job in the past, I deal with it with manner: directly contacting the person. In 99% of the cases, the problem is solved.

Facebook 2.0

Now that you’ve got all this false-debates out of your mind, you can go to the next step and learn that Facebook is not only to reconnect with friends. It also can be a very good tool for networking, telling people about your business or events.

Take me: I came to Japan not knowing a single soul and I wanted to set up my consultancy business. I wanted to learn, I needed exposure and I needed a network.

Searching for people with shared interests, looking at fan pages, exploring and creating groups, browsing through events did put me on the map

That’s bullet-proof: it’s what you want to do with it that will decide how you feel about Facebook. Don’t just be passive. Be proactive.

Trust me, with the current game-changer worldwide trend of a Facebook adoption by a more mature audience, there’s a lot to ponder beyond just listening to people telling you how “creepy” Facebook is.

What a day it was. What a week it was.

Last Friday, the launch event of TEDxTokyo was held in the Japanese capital. The independently organized TED talks was months in the making, by a great team of highly-dedicated people that wanted to add new voices to the Ideas Worth Spreading.

Andrew and I were contacted in the days leading to the May 22 event and volunteered to implement its social web presence. In a matter of days, we used all our expertise to define objectives, setup a strategy and choose the correct technology tools.

The idea was to allow people that couldn’t physically attend TEDxTokyo at the Miraikan to be able to follow the events of the day live via social media tools and a live stream.

Gotcha Media kindly offered the live casting of the event, with their very high quality stream technology. From there, we wanted to tell people to tune in to the live page that was being built.

As we wanted the conversation to get going, but also to facilitate the following of the event for those who couldn’t watch the stream -Friday was a working day after all-, we got our friend and technology enthusiast Steve onboard to run an English Twitter stream. We quickly decided on an official hashtag to get people to expand on the official presence. Moreover, we took the decision that while the event was to be run in English, the Japanese audience was key. The stellar Fumi joined us to run the Japanese Twitter feed.

We then worked on a Facebook presence, creating two Pages for the bilingual audience, as to accomodate an audience that is not using Twitter and because it would allow “Fans” to receive updates after the launch event, TEDxTokyo being a on-going experience.

Then again, we thought. Reading about it and watching a stream is one thing. Feeling like being there is another. We hence decided to record live moments with a small camera and upload them to YouTube and Facebook throughout the day. Live snapshots, via pictures on Flickr, were added to the bunch and people were encourage to share their own moments via a group.

By means of an announcement on the official blog, crowdsourcing began. Using our networks, communities and friends, only 1 day before the event, we shared about the Idea Worth Spreading of a TEDx in Tokyo.

What a day it was.

The team worked like clockwork. Fumi, Steve and Andrew were on the scene, reporting and engaging. I was in Manila, living the experience as anyone else would, giving feedback, ensuring quality control. Steve and I were updating the English channel. People joined the conversation. People tuned into the live stream. People shared. Our hearts were beating with excitation. Our minds were filled by the marvelous stories of the speakers.

We got 3500+ people watching. For a live page that didn’t existed the day before…
We went to #3 in the Twitter trends. For a hashtag and Twitter accounts that didn’t existed 2 days prior…

Wow. Thank you. Thanks to the community for having been there with us. You made our day.

Todd Porter and Patrick Newell deserve my utmost respect for their labor of love -and sweat- of setting up the whole TEDx in Japan. Creating the echo-chamber and the conversation online is all about having something interesting to share. I had the best material to work on.
Huge thanks also go to Cara, it was an honor working with you. Garr for being his stellar-self.
Carolyn, Erik, Jason, Bastian, David, Steve: what a pleasure to collaborate with you all!
…and f I forget anyone, please comment, you deserve it.

Finally, I would like to thank Andrew, Steve and Fumi for being such a fantastic team to work with. I’d do anything to relive that day with you. Wait… we will! TEDxTokyo is a new chapter in a enchanting story.